A ceasefire has been facilitated by U.S. and French diplomats between Israel and Hezbollah, ending nearly 14 months of intense fighting. Apparently, as part of his swansong, Joe Biden has brokered the ceasefire with the help of U.S. State Department officials and their French counterparts. Under the deal, all fighting will cease for 60 days, during which time Israeli troops will pull out of Lebanon, Hezbollah will pull back to north of the Litani River, and the Lebanese army—joined by U.N. peacekeepers and with supplies and training by the U.S. and France—will occupy the demilitarized zone of Southern Lebanon. Also, during this period, about 60,000 Israeli citizens and 1.2 million Lebanese citizens, displaced because of the conflict, will return to their homes.
A number of questions arise: Will the deal hold? What is next? How will peace affect Israel’s war with Hamas in Gaza? To answer the first question, will the deal hold? The agreement, which the Israeli Cabinet endorsed with only one member dissenting (the far-right-wing Itamar Ben-Gvir), was negotiated with Lebanon’s largely ineffectual government, not with Hezbollah directly, but the head of the militia has said Hamas would abide by it as long as Israel does.
Response to the second question—what happens next—is dependent on the assumption that all protagonists will stick to their word. The main sponsor, outgoing U.S. President Biden is sanguine that the fighting will cease permanently. The 60-day span is seen as merely a transition—enough time for Israeli and Hezbollah troops to withdraw and for civilians to return to their homes. Israel explicitly reserves the right to resume fighting if Hezbollah breaks the agreement; Hezbollah claims an implicit right to do so if Israel violates its terms.
Lasting peace is an uphill task if we glance at past instances. In 2006, at the end of the last Israel–Hezbollah war, the U.N. Security Council had passed a resolution calling on both sides to do what this week’s deal proposes to achieve. At that juncture, Israel withdrew, but armed Hezbollah militias never pulled back to north of the Litani River. The Lebanese army was in a shambles, as was the government (Hezbollah had assassinated its prime minister), and U.N. peacekeepers lacked the resources to enforce the deal in toto.
The November 26 deal re-establishes a Commission, which includes U.S. and French officials, that would adjudicate all complaints of violations. Another Committee of seven countries will supposedly help rebuild the Lebanese army (though Biden stressed that no U.S. combat troops will be on the ground in Southern Lebanon). Finally, those countries and others will do something they neglected to do in the last peace—they’ve promised to spend lots of money trying to revitalize the Lebanese government, which has failed to control the country for 50 years.
Coming to the main worry; how will it affect Israel’s war with Hamas? Joe Biden’s optimism is based on the hope that the deal would spur a peace accord in Gaza as well—in any case, his diplomats and their negotiating partners in Egypt and Qatar are trying to restart peace talks—which over the past year have met with obduracy on both sides. The U.S. and Israeli officials are hopeful because of ground realities. Hamas has been battered by the fighting: Its militia is severely weakened; its charismatic leader, Yahya Sinwar, has been martyred; its ties with the region’s other anti-Israel forces—especially Iran and Hezbollah—are all badly damaged.
The last factor is worth considering since until this week, Hezbollah’s leaders had said they would keep firing rockets into Israel until there was a ceasefire in Gaza. Now they say they will abide by the deal signed with Lebanon, as long as Israel does as well—even though the fighting in Gaza persists. Meanwhile, the Iranians—who said they would respond with “crushing” force to Israel’s last missile attack—have refrained from doing so, mainly because they know Israel will retaliate with debilitating force if they do. (Israel’s attack, which was launched in response to an earlier Iranian strike, held back from hitting Iran’s energy and nuclear targets, but it destroyed Tehran’s air-defence systems that would defend those targets from a subsequent attack. Biden, who pressured Israel to keep the attack confined to military targets, publicly said he would let the Israelis attack whatever they wanted if Iran escalated the conflict.)
The situation is further heightened by the statement by President-elect Donald Trump that Israel should “finish” the war in Gaza as quickly as possible, doing whatever it needs to do to “win.” He has criticized Biden for pressuring Israel to moderate its military offensive. In other words, Hamas might be mulling over two or three reasons to strike a deal—some sort of ceasefire and hostage-for-prisoner exchange—in the 53 days while Biden is still President.
The predicament is compounded by the possibility that if Hamas does agree to a quick deal, Benjamin Netanyahu might not. Any deal would likely call for at least the resumption of talks about a Palestinian state—a goal that Netanyahu and his right-wing coalition partners have rejected, even theoretically. Netanyahu still has a goal of “total victory” in Gaza—the wiping out of Hamas as a political or military entity, even though some of his military officers question this goal’s feasibility and think he should accept a less ambitious deal that would free the remaining hostages. However, the Prime Minister has reasons to believe that, after January 20, Trump will allow, even encourage, him to follow his maximalist instincts.
Although the ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah is a significant step towards reducing violence in the region, it does not directly impact the situation in Gaza. The conflict in Gaza continues, without indicating any light at the end of the tunnel. While the ceasefire might create some diplomatic momentum, for now, the people in Gaza will continue to face the hardships of the ongoing conflict. The sad part is that neither the OIC, nor other Muslim states have endeavoured to end the war.
—The writer, Retired Group Captain of PAF, is author of several books on China.
(sultanm.hali@gmail.com)
